Overheating WILL NOT kill a modern GPU. For the last half decade (possibly more) every GPU has a built-in thermal sensor and accompanying thermal shutdown routine. Once the GPU hits a certain temp, a shutdown is initiated. That's it.

It should be noted however that high heat over prolonged periods of time will shorten the life of components.

Maybe the drivers are messing with fan control but like I said, overheating won't kill a GPU. This seems like a perfect example of a developer's tech support talking about something they know nothing about.